Poland was my cradle,

England is my nest;

Durham is my quiet place

Where my weary bones shall rest.

A POLISH meeting. A Polish headline. A Latvian takeaway. A Polish shop - all in very English Darlington. County Durham has not seen such a wave of immigration - Government estimates suggest 3,000 to 5,000 eastern Europeans, mainly Poles - for 150 years when thousands of Irish, Cornish, Scottish, Anywhereish came rushing to dig coal, make steel and build railways.

Today's Poles are not the first. Buried inside the main door of Durham Cathedral is Joseph Boruwlaski. His initials are on the stone, but you have to look hard to find it: it is only 15 inches square.

And Boruwlaski was only 3ft 3ins tall - a pocket-sized Pole.

When he was born in 1739 in Halicz, he was eight inches long. He grew just three more in his first year. His father died when he was six years and nearly two foot, so Boruwlaski went to live with the Countess of Humiecka. It was then fashionable for European noblemen to have a pet dwarf (as Boruwlaski was "perfectly proportioned in his smallness" he wasn't medically a dwarf). The monarchs of Russia and France even tried to get their dwarves to breed, and poor Boruwlaski was set upon by Bebe, the King of Poland's dwarf. Bebe was jealous of Boruwlaski's height - Boruwlaski was smaller than Bebe - and so he tried to lob him on the fire.

The Countess of Humiecka nicknamed Borulwaski 'Jou-Jou' - 'plaything' - and toured him round the courts of Europe where he entertained with his cute dancing and violin-playing. Aged 15, he sat on the lap of the Hapsburg Empress Maria Theresa and saucily told her: "I have observed nothing so wonderful as to see such a little man on the lap of so great a woman." Entranced, she pulled a jewelled ring from her finger but it was far too big, so she told her six-year-old daughter to present Boruwlaski with one of hers - this was how Marie Antoinette lost her ring, but as she lost her head during the French Revolution it didn't matter much in the end.

When Boruwlaski was 40, he fell in love with his Countess' lady-in-waiting, Isalina. In a pique of jealousy, the Countess kicked him out. They married and had a daughter. To support them, Boruwlaski became a touring freak show. In London, he appeared with 'a stupendous giant', 8ft 4ins tall.

"The giant remained sometime mute," wrote Boruwlaski in his diary. "Then stooping very low he offered me his hand, which I am sure would have enclosed a dozen like mine. He paid me genteel compliment and drew me near to him, that the difference in our size might strike the spectators the better; the top of my head not reaching his knee."

He spent time with Daniel Lambert - Britain's fattest man - in Leicester. Daniel weighed 739lbs; Jou-Jou was no more than 60lbs. Boruwlaski revealed to Lambert that when the standard-sized Isalina was fed up with him she popped him on the mantelpiece and went out.

In 1751, Boruwlaski retired to Durham City, principally because he was friendly with the musical Ebdon family, although he was also impressed by the "brilliant assemblies which give us so favourable an opportunity to admire the elegant and beautiful features of the ladies".

He lived uneventfully - known by Durham miners as 'canny aad man' - in a cottage near Prebends Bridge until his death at the remarkable aad age of 97 in 1837.

His cottage has been demolished, although his summerhouse - a mock Grecian temple - is now known as 'the Count's House'. His tiny clothes are in Durham Town Hall and his story is told more fully in David Simpson's new book entitled Durham City.